The operation of an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) may be controlled by data stored in control registers in the ASIC. When the ASIC is powered on, a reset signal may be transmitted to the ASIC. This reset signal may trigger a register initialization in which the contents of the control registers may be set to default values. Upon completion of the register initialization, the ASIC may enter an operating mode.
The default values in the control registers may not be appropriate for one or more operations the ASIC may perform in the operating mode. A processor may perform read and write operations to the control registers to configure the control registers for the operating mode. Depending on the number of control registers, the configuration may take several seconds. However, the processor may not have read or write access to the control registers during the register initialization. When the ASIC enters the operating mode, certain control registers may still contain default values that may not be appropriate for the operation the ASIC is performing. Thus, the ASIC may begin operating before it is appropriately configured for the operating mode. This may result in a “gray” operating period in which the performance of the ASIC may be unpredictable.